Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to peptides, nucleic acids and cells for use in immunotherapeutic methods. In particular, the present invention relates to the immunotherapy of cancer. The present invention furthermore relates to tumor-associated cytotoxic T cell (CTL) peptide epitopes, alone or in combination with other tumor-associated peptides that serve as active pharmaceutical ingredients of vaccine compositions that stimulate anti-tumor immune responses. The present invention relates to several novel peptide sequences and their variants derived from HLA class I and HLA class II molecules of human tumor cells that can be used in vaccine compositions for eliciting anti-tumor immune responses.
Description of Related Art
B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL), also known as chronic lymphoid leukemia (CLL), is the most common type of leukemia.
Leukemias are cancers of the white blood cells (leukocytes). CLL affects B cell lymphocytes. B cells originate in the bone marrow, develop in the lymph nodes, and normally fight infection by producing antibodies. In CLL, B cells grow out of control and accumulate in the bone marrow and blood, where they crowd out healthy blood cells. CLL is a stage of small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL), a type of B-cell lymphoma, which presents primarily in the lymph nodes. CLL and SLL are considered the same underlying disease, just with different appearances.
CLL is a disease of adults, but, in rare cases, it can occur in teenagers and occasionally in children (inherited). Most (>75%) people newly diagnosed with CLL are over the age of 50, and the majority are men, with a median age of 70 years at the time of diagnosis. Though less common, CLL sometimes affects people between 30 and 39 years of age. The incidence of CLL increases very quickly with increasing age.
In the United States, during 2012 about 16,060 new cases are expected to be diagnosed, and 4,580 patients are expected to die from CLL.
CLL is very rare in Asian countries, such as Japan and China, and may account for as few as 10 percent of all leukemias in those regions.
In view of the above, there remains a need for new efficacious and safe treatment option for cancers, in particular chronic lymphoid leukemia (CLL) and other cancers of the blood of different phenotypes which improve the well-being of the patients by not using excessive chemotherapeutic agents or other agents that may lead to severe side effects.